Eponymous
by ravynechyylde
Summary: Part I: The Persephone Effect Part II: The Valentine Effect
1. The Persephone Effect

Although far from being an innocent maiden, Vincent thinks, from time to time, about changing his name.

_~persephone~_

It is ridiculous for a Turk – efficient, order-driven, **remorseless** – to feel violated, but he felt such visceral helplessness the moment he woke from his 30-year sleep to discover himself straddling the line between this world and whatever comes after, belonging to neither but caught in both.

_~a painting and a legend~_

Dr. Jeraldine Foretson, a fellow with the Center for Civilian Biodefense Strategies. Invited to speak about threats of terrorism upon Midgar and, less ostensibly, against ShinRa. As ShinRa's first and final defense against terrorists, it only made sense that he and the rest of the Turks had been present. She had had brown hair, brown eyes, glasses, and a slight frame. Wholly unremarkable and more than a little apprehensive about being inside ShinRa headquarters, considering what she had to say.

"We call the potential misapplication of science the _Persephone Effect_, named after the myth of an innocent girl who was kidnapped and forced to share her time between the underworld and Earth." An image of a painting was projected onto the screen. "The myth accounts for the change of the seasons and the annual cycle of growth and decay."

Vincent had stared hard at the painting.

"Biology, medicine, agriculture, and other life sciences were always considered the 'good' sciences, but like Persephone they could be used to bring death and destruction in the form of biological weapons." Foretson had paused for a moment to proceed to the next slide.

"Recent advances in Mako refinement techniques, microbiology, and genetics are areas of concern." _Click_. "The same cell-injection technology used to strengthen livestock could, with just a minute increase in dosage, result in populations of carnivorous… monsters, with increased strength, speed, and invulnerability to tasers, normal bullet wounds, and status magic." _Click_. "Antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria help scientists determine which antibiotic therapies will be most effective in treating an illness, but former Junon bioweapons manufacturers are suspected of using this technology to develop super-virulent, Mako-enhanced forms of infectious diseases." _Click_. The young woman had drawn a deep breath. "And last year, it was discovered that NeoGen and JenKor –" _Well-known subsidiaries of the ShinRa Corporation_ was the unspoken thought hovering over the entire room. "– were performing preliminary research on the effects of Mako treatments on human subjects." Silence – some of it uncomfortable, some indignant, and far too much of it nonchalant – blanketed the audience.

Here, the doctor had clicked the presentation off and signaled that the lights be turned on again. Vincent blinked, the after-image of the painting seemingly branded on the inside of his eyelids. Dr. Foretson removed her glasses, her eyes suddenly large and bright. "My colleagues and I… our research suggests that these technologies could make harmless unregulated organisms dangerous and render obsolete current policies to restrict access to dangerous chemicals, pathogens, and procedures."

The rest of that day was forgettable. The good doctor had been swiftly and politely thanked for her time and dismissed with nary a question. There had been a few business and development meetings after that, in which teams of new people came in to report on the various Mako experiments Foretson had just been pleading with them to discontinue. Vincent might have gone on a mission later. He might have killed someone. Just business as usual.

A few weeks later, after reading in one of ShinRa's security reports about the 'terrorist attacks' that claimed the lives of several prominent members of the Center for Civilian Biodefense, he had felt a tickle of what must have been relief at not receiving that assignment. Persephone had flickered before his eyes.

_~used~_

If he keeps some distance from it, he can think about his situation with relative equanimity, as if the life he leads is not his own. A Turk is, in the simplest terms, a tool that the ShinRa Corporation used to obtain power and then keep it. He and his colleagues were the diplomats, negotiators, work-site supervisors – the voice of ShinRa. And when those things didn't work, or didn't work fast enough, they were the spies, thieves, assassins – the invisible hands that cultivated obedience by eradicating dissension, sowing the bloody seeds of domination so that ShinRa didn't have to.

Just because no one saw them didn't mean they weren't there. It's the same way with the blood on his hands – invisible but inescapable.

He examines himself clinically, and concludes that many of the advancements made to his body would have been invaluable as a Turk: increased strength, speed, and agility; enhanced senses; a claw 100 times stronger and more sensitive than his hand; vital organs no longer localized but spread in a diffuse network throughout his body so that, save his head, one bullet would not be sufficient to slow him down, let alone kill him.

Occasionally he manages to snatch a dream about a lucky bullet before the demons begin their clamoring.

_~kidnapped~_

He has been redesigned, remodeled like one of his guns to be better at a job he was already dangerously good at. His only consolation is that, if necessary, he will use these tools at his disposal to survive, to prolong his own life instead shortening others on the whim of a ruthless businessman.

_~forced~_

It haunts him, the ingenious design of the claw that makes everything feel _real_. It is so easy to forget that it is not his hand until he has unintentionally hurt someone, reminding him that he is not a man but merely a patchwork monster, each demon, each gruesome modification a facet of Hojo that that man sought to bury in Vincent. When he allows himself to reflect on it, he is horrified at how easily he adapted to these terrible changes, as if the transition from human to devil were trifling. Truly the most painful vengeance Hojo could have wreaked was making Vincent face _himself_. Still, he feels some small satisfaction in knowing that any triumph Hojo might have experienced over him was accidental, just like the rest of his work.

_~growth~_

No, he finally muses, it would never work. While Persephone brought winter to the world, she was at least permitted to bring spring back to it. He has no such recourse.

_~decay~_

Where his life used to be a permanent winter, cold and unrelenting and dead, now it is nothing, a black pit of failure and guilt, a suitable receptacle for the demons he plays host to. It is fitting that they – and he – remain here, essentially interred in the ShinRa mansion, for the sake of the world. He has convinced himself, even if he can't stifle the traitorous thought –

_there can be no spring for me_


	2. The Valentine Effect

"Oh my GAWD, Vinnie, that is so AWESOME!" Yuffie whisper-screamed very close to his ear. Vincent held up a swift hand to indicate that her enthusiasm was, perhaps, ill-timed. She seemed to understand, even if she did continue to vibrate with the force of her excitement. He ignored the minor tic in his left eye and rotated the combination lock one last time with his human hand while using his claw to 'hear' the internal discs clicking into place.

He cracked the safe open and had to dodge Yuffie as she dove towards the contents. "Collect your things and let us be off," he said in his usual quiet monotone, eyes searching the shadows as he kept his hand on his gun. She opened her mouth wide and he quickly added, "And please be quiet."

Yuffie nodded sheepishly and gathered the few globes of materia into the pouch on her waist. He could hear her muttering, "Yeesh, last time I forget the combo to my OWN SAFE." He refrained from pointing out that the safe in the ShinRa mansion was in no conceivable way hers, as he certainly didn't care to start an argument that he had little chance of winning. That would have required Yuffie to have a sense of shame. The girl in question stood up soon enough and tugged a little on his cloak. "Okay, Vinnie, let's blow this popsicle stand."

He nodded, and the two left the mansion without further difficulty.

At least Yuffie was smart enough to wait until they were far away from Nibelheim to begin her usual chatter-dance of motion that had puzzled him when they had first met. It was a kind of hopping-skipping-run with a few jabbing motions of her fist and the occasional twirl. She would be behind him at one moment, then suddenly be facing him, causing him to almost stumble over her until he realized she had already moved off to his side, only to repeat the process until they reached their destination. The whole time, she would be talking about everything and nothing; occasionally, she said something that required a response, and he would indulge her.

Vincent added his hard-won ability to continue walking normally while she indulged in her antics to the list of benefits from his time with AVALANCHE. Still, he noticed that she was capering a bit less today and was looking at him a lot more. More precisely, at his claw.

He supposed he couldn't blame her, even as he tried not to hide it self-consciously. It was human nature to stare at the unusual, to try and define it somehow in terms of everyday experience. Still, no matter how outlandish her way of life was, he defied her to come to grips with who or what he was.

After a few miles, they came upon a suitable spot to make camp for the night on the outskirts of a dense forest. Vincent preferred to have the option of ducking between the trees if necessary, even if it meant dealing with the occasional curious animal. He built up a small fire while Yuffie unloaded their packs and unrolled her sleeping bag. He had stated firmly that he would be on watch all night, and the ninja had given in fairly graciously since he was doing her a big favor. He never came out and said that he didn't like Nibelheim, but he knew Yuffie was observant enough to pick up on his discomfort.

She had finished her rustling and was currently sharing the log he sat on as they both stared into the flames. Soon enough, her gaze had once again focused on his claw. "Y'know, Vinnie, when I asked you to help me with my safe – " The tic in his eye returned briefly. " – I never woulda guessed that that's how you would do it."

He assumed that she had left the silence for him. "What did you imagine I would do?"

"Oh, I dunno," she responded airily, "either blast it good with the Death Penalty, or go all _Chaos_ on it." At the exasperated roll of his eyes, she sighed and said, "I'm _kidding_, Vinnie. Come _on_, lighten up." She scooted a little closer to him, close enough that he could see the reflection of his appendage as a golden flicker in her eye.

"Besides, what you did was way cooler. I've never seen anyone crack vaults with their fingers!"

He held up his claw and looked at it momentarily before lowering it. "Hojo's modifications allowed me to do it. Compared to a normal human hand, the palm is about ten times more sensitive to tactile stimuli, and the fingers are about 100 times more sensitive."

"Cool!" she grinned at him. "I wish my hand had an instruction manual. 'Congratulations on the purchase of your new Yuffie-brand HAND, complete with FINGER attachments and OPPOSABLE THUMB!'" She chuckled as she wiggled the digits of her hand, and he had to smile a little bit. Yuffie had always kept him from taking himself too seriously, and her words didn't send him into an immediate spiral of gloom as they once might have.

She still looked intrigued, so Vincent dredged up the contents of an old R&D briefing from his days as a Turk, carefully setting aside the memories of Dr. Foretson's pleading eyes and the painting of Persephone. "As I recall, ShinRa was in the preliminary phases of Mako experimentation on humans when I was there." Yuffie was suddenly sitting unnaturally still, as if worried that any sudden motion might frighten him off of this unusually forthcoming conversation. "One of the research labs had been working on the effects of Mako-processing various substances, and they were able to create metals that bonded to organic tissue and nerve cells to increase their receptor activation while retaining the durability of the base metal."

Yuffie had not moved appreciably, but her eyes were huge as she tried to process everything he said. "ShinRa research had not formally progressed to the point of human prosthetics, but," and here the bitterness seeped into his voice, "with a completely helpless test subject at his mercy, how could Hojo forego the opportunity to advance the state of science?" He held up his claw again, examining it by the red glow of the campfire.

Callused fingers brushed against the metal of his forearm, making the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He quickly dropped his claw and looked at Yuffie, fingers still outstretched and her expression faraway. Eventually she came back to herself, looking inexplicably sorry. He hoped furiously that it was not pity.

"Wow, who woulda guessed it'd be warm?" Yuffie said softly. She unclipped the brace on her leg from the hooks on her shorts and rolled down the stocking so that her left knee was exposed. She then slung said leg into his lap without warning.

Vincent looked at the leg uneasily, then at her, then back at the leg. He cleared his throat and said, "Yuffie, I do not think –"

"Oh hush, Vinnie," she said with a business-like tone, even as her face turned a little pink at her own audacity and his warmth, muted by clothing, against her skin. "When I was a kid, I had a bit of a run-in with some stupid boy in the Da Chao Fire Cave. He bet me I couldn't walk across the flames in the cavern, I told him only an inbred idiot would make such a dumb bet, and we ended up getting into a fistfight that left me dangling off the face of Da Chao before my nurse could stop me. I ended up twisting my knee out of position pretty bad, so bad they thought I might never walk again." She sighed. "My mother never forgave herself, and my father... didn't take _that_ too well." The young ninja shook off her melancholy.

"Which brings me to my point! I guess by the time I was seven, word of that Mako experimentation must have gotten to Wutai, because I was taken to ShinRa headquarters in Midgar and had a metal graft placed in my leg." She wiggled her toes invitingly. "Go on, I'll bet you can feel it."

Hesitantly, he placed the fingers of his claw on the smooth skin of her inner thigh, snatching it away when she giggled. "Sorry, Vinnie, I'm a bit ticklish." At her insistent look, he placed his claw again, and as she flexed her thigh, he could indeed feel the abnormal vibrations of the metal graft shifting against muscle and tendon and bone. "It's Mako-enhanced aluminum. The doc said I can take off the brace permanently in a year or two. And that's exciting news, cuz I hate this thing!"

The gunman gently pushed her leg off of his lap, and she took the hint and started rolling the stocking up and re-clasping the brace. "Yeah, it'll be like it never happened. Which is really saying something, if you saw my leg at the time. Man, it was diiiisgusting, all purply-bruised and mangled and hangin' off at a weird angle. And it hurt SO bad, I didn't want to think about washing it, forget standing on it. Then all my training as a ninja never woulda happened." Her voice had become very young and quiet. "And what would I have? A whole lotta _nothing_. Still," she said eventually, "I guess I can't be too happy."

It startled Vincent to hear her, of all people, say that. "Why not?"

"Well, it seems wrong to know that someone suffered for my happiness and still be okay with it, you know? You're my friend, Vinnie, and that makes it even worse. Gawd, that's like the worst thing I could think of!" Yuffie slammed her fist down on her leg. Her eyes had taken on a suspicious sheen, probably from some combination of grief and indignation, all of it for him.

"If it makes you feel better, Yuffie, I am glad that my pain was not for nothing."

She looked up at him with disbelief on her face. "Oh Vincent!" she cried, "it's not fair! That you had to –"

"No, it is not fair. But it is how things unfolded. And," he said haltingly, to put her mind at ease, "I cannot say that misery has been the only outcome."

"Why, _Mistah_ Valentine," she said slyly, recovering admirably from her tears with only a sniffle, "do you mean to tell me that 'being with us all isn't so bad?'"

Again, he couldn't stop his lips from quirking a bit. "Do you mean to tell me that you actually listen to anything anyone says?"

"_Vincent_." Yuffie held a hand to her chest, an injured expression on her face. "That was practically a declaration of love, coming from you. You think I wasn't paying attention?" He gave her an eloquent look but held his peace.

"Well _any_way, I'm glad you don't hold the leg thing against me. Not that I thought you would," she continued hastily when he began to frown. "You're better than that." Before he could argue the point, she said, "I'm looking for a word. It's like… um… ok, someone does something bad, and they think that's that. But then something good comes out of it. You know what I mean?"

Before he could stop himself, Vincent found himself saying, "Unfortunately, I only know of the reverse."

"Yeah, the Persephone Effect, but what's the opposite of that?"

Vincent's already stiff posture became absolutely rigid at that point, and Yuffie found herself being scrutinized within an inch of her life by those blood-red eyes. "How do you know about Persephone?" he asked in a low, dangerous voice.

Her guard was up – the man sounded like she was threatening his little sister or something – and she answered slowly. "As second of Wutai, I was tutored in all the usual subjects and then a couple not so usual ones." She counted off on her fingers. "Foreign Cultures. Deportment. Formal Dance. Crisis Management. I would sit in on some of my father's meetings on the state of scientific advancement, both in Wutai and abroad. And that included the usual round of philosophizing from various advisors and clansmen, so I must have heard someone use the phrase then." Yuffie glanced away from him, rubbing her arm uncomfortably. "My tutor told me the story. And showed me the painting." She shivered.

"Yes, I've seen it."

"She was terrified. And he didn't care," the ninja whispered, barely audible. She looked up to see him nod. "Why, where'd you hear about it?"

"One of my Turk briefings," he said shortly, clearly disinclined to say more. She continued to stare him down, expecting a more cogent explanation for his burst of hostility, as he remained resolutely silent.

"We'll call it the _Valentine Effect_, then," Yuffie said with a guileless smile, abruptly breaking their stalemate. "Sometimes, good –" The girl tapped the metal brace. "– can come from things done out of anger, or sorrow, or evil." She looked at him thoughtfully before returning her gaze to the small campfire. The gunman was grateful that she did not require a response as he cautiously mulled over her words, the optimism contrasting sharply with the anger still flickering in his breast.

"Hmm, you know, this reminds me of those crappy camping trips I used to take as a kid. Godo would always try to teach us about 'the spiritual web that binds us to the Planet,' and how we needed to be 'one with Nature' –" Her liberal use of air-quotes made Vincent wonder if she regarded _anything_ as sacred. " – but when he thought we weren't looking he'd pull out the bug repellant and a flashlight. We always saw, though."

"Are you not an only child?"

His question threw Yuffie for a moment, reminding her that his silence meant he was listening, not ignoring her. "Oh yeah, he used to take me and my cousins. I've gotta _ton_ of those." She rolled her eyes. "Anyways, since we're here and we've got a campfire, we can tell ghost stories. My cousins told some pretty lame ones. You could always tell what was going to happen."

"Why would we tell ghost stories?"

"To try and scare… each… other…" It seemed a careless question until she refocused on his shrouded figure, eyes alight in his solemn face. Vincent's life had been one big horrorfest, filled with betrayal and unspeakable cruelty and, yes, even a ghost. Jenova-enhanced, perhaps, but still doing what ghosts do best, drowning him in guilt.

She sighed and scowled, mostly at herself. "Alright, Vinnie, you win."

"…I know." His quiet acceptance was almost more than Yuffie could bear, and she mentally grasped for something to say. He was far too good at that: making her want to fill the silence with something other than regret and_ if only_.

"Ooooh, I've got a story for ya!" Yuffie said gleefully. "It's about your name." Without waiting for his acquiescence or her brain to actually catch up with her mouth, she launched into the tale.

"So, there's this legend about this dude – well, I guess he was a priest. Anyways, this priest dude, Valentinus, was going around marrying people, even after the big guy in charge, Emperor Something-or-other, said 'Ix-nay on eddings-way'– hey, you still with me, Vinnie?"

"…Yes."

"Well, just let me know if I lose ya, huh?" She wouldn't hold her breath. "Anyways, Emperor Meanie catches him doing these secret weddings, and sentences him to death. Way harsh, huh? Yeah, so while he's in jail, waiting to have his head lopped off – yeee-uck – Valentinus cures the jailer's daughter of her blindness. Yipee wahoo, she can see again! So get this: the girl falls in love with him, but she can't pull the strings to get his head off the chopping block. But just before he meets his maker, Valentinus gets a goodbye note to her saying –" Yuffie took a deep breath in anticipation of the excitement she was going generate. " – 'From your Valentine.' And that's why we celebrate Valentine's Day!"

Yuffie finished her story with a flourish and was undaunted by the complete lack of reaction that Vincent provided. She hadn't expected much of anything: most people didn't listen to what she said after, "Hey, check this out!" and Vincent was never one to clutter up a good silence with, oh, maybe _words_. Well, she had thought it was an interesting, if slightly morbid, story. It fit her audience, in that sense.

She was just about to launch into the story about her cousin Toshi and his unfortunate encounter with the three-legged adamantoise when Vincent asked a simple but completely unanticipated question. "And where did you learn _that_ story?"

"Err… when I was looking up everyone's names. Y'know, just to kill some time." _Yuffie, you are a super ninja genius!_ "Some of them were obvious. Like Cloud, that airhead. No symbolism there, right? Wallace is Old Mideelian for 'hair accessory.' And Nanaki is…um… CosmoCanyonese… for 'he who cannot use skis.' Betcha didn't know that, huh Vince?"

"Yuffie."

"Yeah?"

"Tell me honestly –"

"You know me," she said off-handedly, then glared at his wary expression.

" –why did you look up my name?"

It was in his nature to be suspicious of any attention thrown his way, she guessed. "Be-_cause_, Vinnie, I was bored and I was looking up everyone else's."

"No you were not." Yikes, her heart had jumped into her throat when Vincent had called her out.

"Yes I was. Oooh, and get this: Cid is Middle Nibelheimian for 'wheelbarrow.'" _Good recovery there, genius._

"Yuffie. Do not lie to me." He didn't sound angry, but his voice warned her against arguing with him. Like she might lose something really important.

"Gawd, Vinnie, you're openin' up a whole new can of worms," she moaned uncomfortably.

"That has never stopped me in the past."

"Guess not," she muttered, then cleared her throat. "Fine. I wasn't looking up everyone's name. I was just… looking up yours." His gaze made her feel like a pinned butterfly, still alive and fluttering in vain. "So I would have something to talk about with you! On the off chance that I got you all to myself. Like we are now." She looked away. "Y'know, something I thought you might be interested in, instead of my usual blah-blah-blah. So you wouldn't think I'm a _complete_ moron." She bit her lower lip. "How was I supposed to know we'd end up talking about Persephone and then you'd get all mad at me?"

That was the first time he had seen fear in Yuffie's eyes directed at him since he had caught her off-guard in the basement of the ShinRa mansion.

"I am… not angry at you, Yuffie. Definitely not," he said a little more gently than usual. She smiled a little, nervousness receding behind her oddly focused, hungry gaze.

"There's just… somethin' about you, Vinnie. I can't quite wrap my head around it. But I know it's worth it, if I just hang in there. Even if I end up annoying you to death, I'm gonna figure it out. And it'll be awesome. 'Cause I'll never meet anyone like you again."

Technically true. She would never meet anyone exactly like him again, and the same could be said of Nanaki, Cloud, Tifa, even Reno. But maybe her statement went beyond simple fact. How else could he explain the feeling that she wanted to hold him up to the light and examine every angle, every facet that he had?

To be the recipient of that heated intent was not something his exhaustive ShinRa training and three decades of atonement had prepared him for. Especially not from Yuffie, who was looking at him with a world of possibilities shaping itself in her bright eyes.

Fleetingly, Vincent thought he knew what it felt like to be a Knights of the Round materia.

"~I want to do to you what spring does to the cherry blossoms~," she murmured in Wutainese, her words full and round like drops of water falling from her lips. The man wondered if she even realized that she had spoken out loud. He couldn't suppress the visions of innumerable _sakura_ trees bursting with life at the height of the season, the seemingly endless rain of blossoms, flashes of golden sunlight dazzling his young eyes between the clusters of flowers, and the odd ache in his chest at being allowed to experience all of that.

No one had ever said anything like that to him before. As if he could be something so wonderful that it hurt to look at him. As if those words he would deny thinking – _there can be no spring for me_ – had never been uttered in the confines of his own mind.

"Yes, that right there!" Yuffie was making a stabbing motion with her finger that broke him out of his musings. "Your eyes were all-! And your mouth went like - " She was leaning forward, face painfully earnest. "Like you were thinking about something that used to make you happy. You know, but in an uncomplicated sort of way. That's what I havta do." She huffed a little at his blank expression and muttered, "I swear you were."

Some vague schoolboy memory surfaced: a brush in his hand, dutifully copying the names of the months, analyzing and reciting each element in the characters. February had been recently saddled with the terribly mundane _ni-gatsu_. 'Second month,' indeed. But back in his day – and wouldn't Yuffie laugh maliciously to hear him talking like Godo – it had been been given a deeper meaning by one particular poet.

"~…I believe you.~" _She will do her clan name proud, and prove me wrong_, he thought to himself. _It is more than I deserve, but no more than I need._

She opened her mouth to ask what he meant, but he had already begun reciting in a halting cadence,

~_O Kisaragi  
You who wake the trees each year  
Revive me once more._~

She was suddenly struck with the dawning notion that _Vincent knew Wutainese_ and _Vincent had read poetry about __**her**__ name_ and _Vincent had been listening to her whining and cursing and whispered wishing the whole time_. And that shut her right up. Yuffie swallowed and turned to him, her eyes huge.

"I do." And he was surprised to find it was true. "Just call me Fuyuzare Vincent, **Kisaragi**-senpai."

His words caused her heart to speed up a bit. Not just because his smooth, unhurried voice made her name sound like a blessing and the honorific was an unexpected gift on top of that, but because she felt like maybe, at long last, she had achieved an understanding with the man, based on the secrets of a common language and their shared search for meaning. A strange bond, to be sure, but not one that she took lightly.

Yuffie sniffed loudly, as if offended at his stupidity. "'Winter withering' my ass. If I call you anything, it will be _Setsubun_-kun." He raised his eyebrow at the diminutive, and Chaos sent him an offended rumble at the thought of being ritualistically chased out of the 'house' for the coming New Year. He suddenly felt…maybe not _stellar_. But better. Yes, like he could laugh and not have it hurt too much.

Yuffie grinned at him, undimmed, incorrigible, still glowing from the reverence with which he had spoken her name. "Or there's always the crowd favorite, eh, _Vinnie_?"

The cloaked man sighed plaintively, even as the ninja elbowed him shamelessly. He watched the unaffected happiness move over her face, and the blossoming ache in his heart only grew.

Vincent decided to tell Yuffie about the _Kisaragi Effect_ later.

~*~  
Notes:   
**senpai** – more than simple seniority, _senpai_ implies a relationship with reciprocal obligations, somewhat similar to a mentoring relationship. A _kohai_ is expected to respect and obey their _senpai_, and the _senpai_ in turn must guide, protect and teach their _kohai_ as best they can. _Senpai_/_kohai_ relationships generally last for as long as the two people concerned stay in contact, even if the original context in which the _senpai_ was senior is no longer relevant.

**Kisaragi** – traditional name for February in Japanese. The meaning of "kisaragi" is not so deep as those of the other names of the months. It is written as "wearing kimonos over" in kanji; it also means "the rehabilitation of plants." February is the second month of the year. In the lunar calendar, which was used until the Heian Period, February was the second month of winter.

**ni-gatsu** – second month

**fuyuzare** – winter withering; all winter.

**setsubun** – the last day of winter. Features ritualistic chasing of devils out of the house, allowing good luck for the spring (the traditional New Year).


End file.
